Palermo Buenos Aires is the largest barrio in the just north of the center and Palermo Buenos Aires sightseeing is a great favorite for tourists, we decided to create three tours starting just north of Recoleta and this is the final Buenos Aires walking tour in the series. Our first two tours included:
Today, we go further north to Palermo Viejo and Las Cañitas.
If you are thinking of staying in Palermo, check out Palermo Apartments, Soho & Hollywood apartments and Las Cañitas apartments.
Starting a Plaza Italia we walk northwest up Borges Street to Palermo Viejo (old Palermo) to Plaza Serrano, now considered as part of Palermo Soho, also known as Plaza Cortazar.
This is the city’s most fashionable neighborhood. Palermo Viejo is a major shopping, partying and restaurant nucleus with stylish boutiques and major brand name shops, some of Buenos Aires most fantastic restaurants and most certainly the best bars and nightclubs in the city of Buenos Aires.
Palermo Viejo buzzes with shoppers during the day and the trendy partygoers at night. This is a very busy area, particularly at Plaza Serrano, which more recently feels a little bit like a tourist trap, the bars are great for a drink, but we have never had good food in any of the restaurants on the square.
A train track subdivides Palermo Viejo. The south side is Soho and the north Hollywood or south of Juan B Justo Avenue is Palermo Soho and north Palermo Hollywood.
Jorge Luis Borges wrote about this neighborhood in his poem, ‘The mythical foundation of Buenos Aires’, Borges lived at Jose Luis Borges 2135, formerly known as Serrano Street. Not too long ago, Palermo Viejo was run down and a haven for transvestite prostitutes and their punters, who since gentrification have moved to Palermo Park after dark.
A typical Mediterranean style square(ish), narrow, low-rise housing predominates in Palermo Viejo from the latter part of the nineteenth and early twentieth century, there also some much older architectural gems in French, Italian and English styles, but we save architecture for another time. The houses in old Palermo are casa chorizos or sausage houses, with narrow frontage, but long, going back forever and many conceal courtyards.
Palermo Viejo is also scattered with picturesque mews or pasejes, with more quaint houses and shops to explore creating an almost village feel to the area that has made it a big favorite for tourists sightseeing and living.
We tend to leave Palermo Hollywood for nighttimes excursions, the area is more residential with early twentieth century and more modern apartment block terraces of every description and type, usually one or two sausage sizes at the front, with some of the low-rise houses tucked between looking a little out of place. The area is named Hollywood because it was once the home of TV and movie-making, although I am not sure that is still the case and if it is, we are have not seen many studios.
Palermo Hollywood has some great restaurants and resto-bars that always seem a little more adult and a little less American (not a slight, just an observation) than their Soho neighbors do – Soho is definitely a favorite of twenty-something American crowd.
Another point you might consider if you want to stay in Palermo. We think Palermo Soho a little too busy and too noisy for some travelers who want peace and quiet after they sightsee or party and recommend Palermo Hollywood as a little more residential.
Another neighborhood that tourists tend to choose is Palermo’s Las Cañitas. Next to Hollywood and now overlapping parts of Belgrano, Las Canitas has many upscale modern apartment blocks and is close to Palermo’s polo fields. There are many good restaurants and some great late night bars in Las Canitas, they tend to attract a slightly older than the ‘twenty-something’ crowd and many English speaking middle class Argentines.
If you are thinking of staying in Palermo, check out Palermo Apartments, Soho & Hollywood apartments and Las Cañitas apartments.
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